This formerly read-only archive of threads dates back to 1996, but as of March 2007 is open to new postings. For technical reasons, the early dates shown do not accurately reflect the actual date of posting.

Feel free to add new postings to any of the existing threads in the archived forums, but please create any new language-related threads in one of the Language Discussion Forums.

I have been trying to find the origin of the work Cakewalk. Does anyone have some information?

I have found only one brief reference in an etymology book that I have. I am paraphrasing here... It says that it may have originated in the 1860s from the practice of giving the winner of a "walking contest" a cake. Sometime around the late 1800s is got the meaning "something easy."

Well, I kept searching and I have found confirmation of my etymology book and a lot more explanation. Without trying to explain it all here, for those interested, here is a good resource for the word...

I'm just guessing here, Bill, but I'd bet the modern meaning derives from the older "cakewalk." Here in the Midwest, one can still occasionally find a cakewalk, usually at a fall festival or county fair. All the participants (who each pay a small fee) walk around a numbered circle until the music stops (kind of like musical chairs). Then, a number is drawn; whoever is standing on that number wins a cake. Since the only requirement for winning a cake is knowing how to walk (and how to stop), it's a pretty easy contest to win. Eventually, the term "cakewalk" came to mean anything that was extremely easy.

cake·walk (kāk'wôk')
n.
Something easily accomplished: Winning the race was a cakewalk for her.
A 19th-century public entertainment among African Americans in which walkers performing the most accomplished or amusing steps won cakes as prizes.

A strutting dance, often performed in minstrel shows.
The music for this dance.
intr.v., -walked, -walk·ing, -walks.
To perform a strutting dance.

Hey K Allen Griffy, if everyone answered their own question there would be no need for Wordwizard! There are a great many of us who thoroughly enjoy reading the enlightening answers and some of us get tired of your complaints about how dumb we are.

I always thought that a cakewalk meant something that was easy to accomplish.
Wikipedia states that is originates from a dance competition among slaves with a large cake as the prize. Could there be another origin for this phrase?

A cake walk was a game of chance that we used to play at social functions like church picnics and such. It was a fund-raiser. People donated baked goods and other people would purchase tickets to participate in a "musical chairs" sort of contest to win the goodies. The tickets were very cheap and there was a very good chance you would "win". It was a cake walk.